Australian Police Wrongfully Raided a Crypto Miner’s Home over Cannabis Concerns

By Kapil Gauhar

The idea of cryptocurrency mining has attracted all sorts of attention, be it criminals get in on the action, or experts worry about the electricity consumption.

Now, it seems that Australian cryptocurrency miner was mistakenly raided over the Marijuana grow room concerns.

Crypto Mining, Not Growing Cannabis

A crypto miner with multiple machines running at his home has been raided earlier this month. The police suspected the individual of growing cannabis in a room, primarily because of the high electricity consumption associated with the address.

During the raid, the man’s house got severely damaged. As is customary amid the events like these, police officials will enter a property by force.

As per the house owner, his property was not just unlocked, but the gates, doors, and even fence panels were either removed or broken completely.

As the individual hasn’t done anything illegal, Rob Butvila is now asking the Adelaide police force to pay for the damages made.

Where it is comprehensible that the police anticipated to find a marijuana grow room, it would look that some more research could have avoided a lot of potential backlash.

Just because someone is using a lot of electricity doesn’t mean that he is growing drugs in his house. Rather, it is equally possible that something completely legal is going on, like cryptocurrency mining.

What made this location stand out a bit is something that depends on superficial elements. The location has solar panels, which is common. When combined with security cameras and a ventilation fan, the situation becomes a bit different.

However, the fan is required to maintain the temperature of mining equipment.

Now, the question becomes whether this is the beginning of a new trend of not. Where one has to commend the Adelaide police for taking swift action after noticing suspicious behavior, the way they went about this whole raid leaves a few questions unanswered.

For now, the police force won’t comment on the matter either, yet they have assured no offences were detected amid the search.

The further assurance is that cryptocurrency mining won’t be deemed illegal in Australia anytime soon, which is one minor positive aspect to take away from all of this.